UM Prof Accused Of Submitting Ghostwritten Textbook

Dec. 02--A national watchdog group has accused a University of
Miami psychiatrist, Charles Nemeroff, of listing himself as a
co-author of a textbook that was ghostwritten by a writing company
and paid for a major drug maker.

The Washington-based Project on Government Oversight has written
a letter to the National Institutes Of Health complaining about
three publications, including Nemeroff’s, in which a
marketing firm, Scientific Therapeutics Information, performed
ghostwriting about drug benefits that was paid for by a company now
known as GlaxoSmithKline.

Nemeroff and the book’s publisher, the American
Psychiatric Association, emphatically denied the charge.

The book, Recognition and Treatment of Psychiatric Disorders: A
Psychopharmacology Handbook for Primary Care, was published in
1999, when Nemeroff was at Emory University. The co-author was
listed as Alan F. Schatzberg, then chairman of psychiatry at the
Stanford University.

"A draft of the textbook states that it was sponsored by GSK and
written by Diane M. Coniglio and Sally K. Laden of STI," POGO
wrote. "In a letter addressed to Dr. Nemeroff, Ms. Laden provided
an updated status of the textbook. Her timeline states that she
wrote the first draft, which was then sent to Drs. Nemeroff and
Schatzberg, the publisher, and GlaxoSmithKline. The timeline also
notes that GSK was given all three drafts, and was sent page proofs
for final approval."

The POGO letter, dated Monday, was based on documents recently
released in a lawsuit against GlaxoSmithKline. The documents,
independently obtained by The New York Times, were the subject of a
Monday article, "Drug Maker Wrote Book Under 2 Doctors Names,
Documents Say."

In a statement to The Herald, Nemeroff wrote: ". . . Schatzberg
and I conceptualized this project, developed the outline, and wrote
the book. With each successive draft, we scrutinized every page and
rewrote and edited as we deemed necessary. SmithKline Beecham,
which provided an unrestricted educational grant for the project,
had no input concerning its content.

"It is important to note that the book was peer reviewed by
multiple outside experts recruited by both the publisher and the
American Medical Association. No questions of bias were
raised."

The APA posted a statement on its website Wednesday, saying the
book was "was written by the two authors, reviewed for bias by
eight physicians and not ghostwritten by a pharmaceutical company
as suggested in an article in The New York Times."

The letter from Scientific Therapeutics to Nemeroff did not use
the term "ghostwriting" but referred to "developing" the drafts to
be submitted to the named authors and the drug maker.

"This type of editorial assistance was quite common, especially
the use of editorial experts to compile and check facts in books on
pharmacology," said Ron McMillen, chief executive of American
Psychiatric Publishing in the APA statement. "To say the book was
ghostwritten is not true. . . .

"Every book we publish is peer reviewed by medical doctors." In
this case, eight experts saw the manuscript and made "favorable"
comments. "There were more than 500 suggested corrections on the
part of reviewers and all revisions were made to the [published]
manuscript."

The book noted that it had been partly financed from an
unrestricted educational grant from SmithKline Beecham, as the
company was then known, and mentioned the assistance of the
editorial company.

The POGO letter to NIH, written by Danielle Brian and Paul
Thacker, says, "We are writing to urge that NIH curb the practice
of ghostwriting in academia" by withholding NIH funds from those
that have work ghostwritten for them.

"We have discovered that the NIH gave $66.8 million in grants
over the last five years to a handful of researchers who used
ghostwriters for scientific publications," the POGO leaders wrote,
and suggested that NIH action could swiftly stop the practice.

The letter said Nemeroff and co-author Schatzberg have received
$23.3 million in NIH grants over the past five years.

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